Helen Plum Library

"The course of true love is anything but smooth as childhood enemies discover the fine line between love and hate in this heartfelt reimagining of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. Katerina Wilmot and Christopher Petruchio shared backyards as kids, but as adults they won't even share the same hemisphere. That is, until Kate makes a rare visit home, and their fiery animosity rekindles into a raging inferno. Despite their friends' and families'...

The enduring cultural legacy of Shakespeare's Juliet Capulet -- a history "as vital and provocative as the character herself" (Literary Review). Romeo and Juliet may be the greatest love story ever told, but who is Juliet? Demure inǧnue? Or dangerous Mediterranean madwoman? From tearstained copies of the First Folio to Civil War-era fanfiction, Shakespeare's star-crossed heroine has long captured our collective imagination. Juliet is her story, traced...

An investigative journalist takes readers deep inside the inner workings of the mob from the perspective of William "Big Billy" D'Elia, the "adopted son" of legendary organized crime boss Russell Bufalino who was a witness and participant to major historical events that have stymied law enforcement to this day

"The unlikely true story of why we know the name William Shakespeare today, and the four-hundred-year-old book that made it possible. Four hundred years ago, no one bothered to write down the exact words of stage plays. Characters' lines were scribbled on small rolls of paper (as in, an actor's role) and passed around, but no master script was saved for the future. The main reason we've heard of Romeo, Juliet, Hamlet, and Shakespeare himself is that...

"The author tries to come to terms with the life and death of his multitalented longtime friend and brother-in-law, who had been his biggest hero and inspiration"-- "If we're lucky, we all encounter at least one person whose life elevates and inspires our own. For Daniel Wallace, that was his longtime friend and brother-in-law, William Nealy. Seemingly perfect, impossibly cool, William was James Dean, Clint Eastwood, and MacGyver all rolled into...

"It is 1873. Mrs. Eliza Touchet is the Scottish housekeeper--and cousin by marriage--of a once-famous novelist, now in decline, William Ainsworth, with whom she has lived for thirty years. Mrs. Touchet is a woman of many interests: literature, justice, abolitionism, class, her cousin, his wives, this life and the next. But she is also sceptical. She suspects her cousin of having no talent; his successful friend, Mr. Charles Dickens, of being a bully...

"The conquest of indigenous land in the American East through corrupt treaties and genocidal violence laid the groundwork for the conquest of the American West. Acclaimed author Peter Stark exposes the fundamental conflicts at play through the little-known but consequential struggle between two extraordinary leaders. William Henry Harrison was born to a prominent Virginia family, son of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. He journeyed...

"Taking a curtain call with a live snake in her wig... Cavorting naked through the Warwickshire countryside painted green... Acting opposite a child with a pumpkin on his head... These are just a few of the things Dame Judi Dench has done in the name of Shakespeare. For the very first time, Judi opens up about every Shakespearean role she has played throughout her seven-decade career, from Lady Macbeth and Titania to Ophelia and Cleopatra. In a series...

Follows the high school careers of two young, African-American men from inner-city Chicago as they pursue their dream of playing professional basketball

The year is 1921. Lesley Hamlyn and her husband, Robert, a lawyer and war veteran, are living at Cassowary House on the Straits Settlement of Penang. When "Willie" Somerset Maugham, a famed writer and old friend of Robert's, arrives for an extended visit with his secretary Gerald, the pair threatens a rift that could alter more lives than one. Maugham, one of the great novelists of his day, is beleaguered: Having long hidden his homosexuality, his...